Thinking and Inkinghttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com
I have more books than friends.Sun, 10 Dec 2017 11:57:23 +0000enhourly1http://wordpress.com/https://secure.gravatar.com/blavatar/0b1416cf1d50b03b2379b8a784235967?s=96&d=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.wp.com%2Fi%2Fbuttonw-com.pngThinking and Inkinghttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com
CR: The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perryhttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/09/cr-the-essex-serpent-by-sarah-perry/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/09/cr-the-essex-serpent-by-sarah-perry/#commentsSat, 09 Dec 2017 11:57:08 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5381Read More CR: The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry]]>I’m a sucker for a pretty hardback – I’m a sucker for anything that’s aesthetically pleasing – and The Essex Serpent is no exception. I picked this one up because a) I remembered reading a lot of hype about it (update: I just checked and it was Waterstones’ Book of 2016), b) it’s beautiful and c) new books for £2 in charity stores are a godsend. Again, I’m continuing with my habit of avoiding the blurb and diving blindly in.

Initially, I wasn’t quite sure if I was enjoying it. There was something about Perry’s writing style that didn’t quite click with me, although 70% of that was probably due to sheer exhaustion. But do not fear! It gets better!

The plot itself is an intriguing one. Set in Victorian England, there are rumours flying around about a serpent-creature-thing which has crept up from its lair and is now killing people. Just the sort of Gothic tale I wanted, it gets better because it has an independent female protagonist. I like to think that Cora is the kind of woman I’d be if I was relatively wealthy, widowed and living in the Victorian era. She’s curious and independent, doesn’t give a rat’s behind about her appearance and likes dinosaurs and harbours a fascination for the natural world. Cora’s brilliant.

But the other characters are so diverse too – Perry has put so much thought into them, and it’s been a while since I’ve felt characters spring from the page in this way. Cora’s son Francis is an intriguing one – if he were born today, I believe he could be labelled as autistic, or ‘special’, developing attachments to seemingly random objects and although I’ve not heard much from him yet, I’m excited to hear what happens next.

I’m excited for the whole book now. Is there actually a weird-ass serpent, hunting down helpless humanity and having the time of its life? Is this just folklore being used to cover up more sinister deeds? I’ve currently got no idea, but I cannot wait.

Have you read ‘The Essex Serpent’? Have any other Gothic books to recommend? Drop me a line!

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/09/cr-the-essex-serpent-by-sarah-perry/feed/220171209_110419[1]izzycdA Bibiliophile’s Christmas Wishlist 2017https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/03/a-bibiliophiles-christmas-wishlist-2017/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/03/a-bibiliophiles-christmas-wishlist-2017/#commentsSun, 03 Dec 2017 12:22:57 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5364Read More A Bibiliophile’s Christmas Wishlist 2017]]>Now it’s the 2nd of December, I’ve gone Christmas crazy. Feliz Navidad, chicas, because I’m not turning Wham down until the 26th. And what better way to celebrate my devotion to capitalism and materialism through dreaming about what I want for Christmas?

Poetry and wine.

For the second year running, I’d really like someone to just read poetry, drink with me and allow me to think that I am Philosophising, when actually I’m just talking absolute shit. We’d start off reading something witty, like Wendy Cope’s Bloody Men, and then fall deeper into the existential-crisis type poetry (anyone else suffering from epistemological anxiety?), and probably end up with me having a Mildly Angry Political Rant, which has happened at every social gathering I’ve attended in the past year.

Tickets to see Coraline, the opera

My love for Coraline began with the film (rather than Gaiman’s marvellous book), and I’m now ready to spend a ridiculous amount of money to see this, on at the Barbican next March – April. Although I have no idea how this is going to work as an opera, I’m eager to give it a shot. I’d even go in fancy dress – my normal style is 40% Coraline and 60% What-I’ve-Found-in-Mum’s-Wardrobe anyway.

(I’m also itching to see the opera of Sarah Kane’s 4.48 Psychosis, which broke my heart but also set my directorial mind ablaze.)

The Fancy Edition of La Belle Sauvage

I know that Waterstones are milking the Book of Dust hype for all it’s worth, and that this edition is probably just a snazzy marketing technique, but I don’t care. Have you seen this book? It’s beautiful.

Custom built bookshelves (or just a really long piece of wood, so I can do a bodge) (or some bookends, because the ones on top of my desk really aren’t doing the trick)

This blog is a testament to the escalation of my book buying habits. Although recently, I’ve not been posting as many book hauls, rest assured that I’m still hoarding. It has now got to the stage where the shelves are full, the book cases are full, and I’m currently stacking books horizontally. This is an absolute pain in the neck when that one poetry anthology is at the bottom of a fifteen-books-high pile. I have the bruise on my toes to prove it.

At this point, I can’t think of much else, apart from everything on this website, lots of books and free train travel for the next year. Or a driving licence. I don’t what’s the most unlikely, in all honesty.

Merry Christmas, folks. I was intending to do blogmas this year, but I’m selling my soul to the English and History departments in exchange for decent coursework grades. I’ll try to keep blogging every week, but if there’s radio silence, rest assured that I’m burning in the depths of hell, anxiously scribbling away.

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/03/a-bibiliophiles-christmas-wishlist-2017/feed/220171203_112435[1]izzycdReacting to ‘Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure’https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/25/reacting-to-fanny-hill-or-memoirs-of-a-woman-of-pleasure/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/25/reacting-to-fanny-hill-or-memoirs-of-a-woman-of-pleasure/#commentsSat, 25 Nov 2017 14:44:17 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5367Read More Reacting to ‘Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure’]]>I should have clocked on that this was erotic fiction by the title alone. In all my Catholic school innocence, I thought that this would be an interesting glimpse into the life of a 18th Century lady of leisure and woman of pleasure. Refined, genteel, with a little about embroidery and perhaps one steamy sexual encounter.

(side note: there is some sexual content ahead, most of it in the form of elaborate metaphor. This is a warning to preserve your sanity.)

Just shows that I didn’t even read the blurb, which very explicitly says ‘erotic fiction’. Yes, my first foray into the world of erotic literature was not Fifty Shades of Fantastically Awful Frolics, but a novel considered to be ‘the first original English prose pornography’, according to David Foxon. To think that Fifty Shades is a descendent of this undoubtedly… elegant novel is quite alarming.

But the emphasis should be on ‘pornography’, because blimey, this is graphic. I skimmed my way through the whole shebang – from when she loses her virginity, to a really weird incident that apparently includes group participation. Personally, this wasn’t the sort of book that I feel inclined to relish. I’m still shuddering.

What amused me most was how Cleland hasn’t even used the word ‘penis’. Bearing in mind that I’ve only skimmed vaguely through sections, trying not to laugh and cry and gouge my eyes out, I’ve not seen an explicit mention of anatomical parts. It’s not a penis, it’s a member, a sword, a machine. There’s even a rather amusing ‘cock-pit’ pun.

But despite how dubious I’ve made this entire novel sound, the way in which Cleland describes it all can be rather beautiful, in a weirdly graceful way. There’s no animalistic thrusting or fumbling with bra straps here; most characters appear to possess a deadly accuracy with their weapons. Read this, if you dare:

lifting the linen veil that hung between us and his master member of the revels, [he] exhibited one whose eminent size proclaimed the owner a true woman’s hero

From Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure

The bits that I’ve read make me wonder how sexually frustrated John Cleland was, because there’s some odd goings on. Researching Fanny Hill’s historical context might be the way forward – disassociating myself from the hoo-ha and seeing it through my historian’s eyes might stop me wanting to sink into the ground and die. Although I’ve not read the book studiously cover-to-cover, I’m tempted to give this one another go. Despite the fact that I now smirk a little at any mention of a sword, I think I want to give the whole book a try. It’s strange, being held witness to all these descriptions of staffs and members and swords and god-knows what else.

This book is kinky as hell – no wonder it was banned – but at least I won’t be having to discuss it in any English lessons. Thank Christ.

Have you read ‘Fanny Hill’? Do you even want to? Drop me a line!

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/25/reacting-to-fanny-hill-or-memoirs-of-a-woman-of-pleasure/feed/420171125_142149[1]izzycdThe Bloody Chamber by Angela Carterhttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/18/the-bloody-chamber-by-angela-carter/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/18/the-bloody-chamber-by-angela-carter/#commentsSat, 18 Nov 2017 14:13:18 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5360Read More The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter]]>Could this be one of my top three reads of this year?

Hell yes.

My English teacher and best friend (not that the two are the same person, you understand) both recommended The Bloody Chamber. I wanted a short, sharp read that would take my mind off any feelings of stress and impending doom, and the library gods were obviously feeling in a generous mood. This is the first – and perhaps the last – time I will say this, but The Bloody Chamber is a book I really, really wish I could study. I want to go over it with a magnifying glass, analyse every single description to hell and back because after reading this, I know that Carter’s writing deserves this amount of attention.

Her style is delectable and opulent, letting you savour every single damn word. I feel like I’m talking about a piece of cheese, but it’s true. I opened The Bloody Chamber at a random page, and selected this sentence, again more or less at random:

In spite of my fear of him, that made me whiter than my wrap, I felt there emanate from him, at that moment, a stench of absolute despair, rank and ghastly, as if the lilies that surrounded him had all at once begun to fester, or the Russian leather of his scent were reverting to the elements of flayed hide and excrement from which it was composed.

From The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter

That’s one sentence. One sentence in an entire book full of them. In my opinion, it’s beautiful. It’s all beautiful. Carter describes her characters and settings with such an eloquent precision that made me want to scream ‘Yes! That is my favourite type of writing!’

But it’s not just the writing style. The stories themselves are engaging, filled with twists and turns that I did not expect at all. To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what I was expecting, bar the promise of ‘retold fairytales’ on the blurb. But these aren’t really retold fairytales, in the sense that the original stories have been reworked with new endings and new characters. I feel that these stories are very much Carter’s own, though there are elements of Beauty and the Beast and Little Red Riding Hoodfor example, there is never the whole, original story.

These stories are dark and Gothic and the perfect book to read on a winter’s night, which is exactly what I did. I wouldn’t recommend staying up until God-knows-when and ignoring any looming essay deadlines, but The Bloody Chamber is the perfect form of escapism. There are female protagonists, for crying out loud! There’s blood and mythical creatures and strangely attractive (but sometimes dangerous) men. It’s magic realism in all its glory.

And Puss-in-Boots is one of the funniest short stories I’ve read, ever. It’s full of euphemisms – the type of which I’d only expect to find in certain English lessons – and Puss’s characterisation is vivid and downright bloody hilarious.

The Bloody Chamber has rapidly become one of my favourite reads of 2017. It’s magical and mystical and I have once again fallen head-over-heels in love.

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/18/the-bloody-chamber-by-angela-carter/feed/920171118_140806[1]izzycdLa Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullmanhttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/11/la-belle-sauvage-by-philip-pullman/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/11/la-belle-sauvage-by-philip-pullman/#commentsSat, 11 Nov 2017 14:01:12 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5279Read More La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman]]>The man himself describes La Belle Sauvage as an ‘equel’, designed to stand alongside His Dark Materials in all its magnificent glory. But does it really?

YES. Yes! YES!

(Notice how I’m trying to think about this book critically, rather than screaming ‘OH MY GOD THIS IS NEW PHILIP PULLMAN YES YES YES YES YES’. Like a good cheese, I’m maturing.)

Or not, as the case may be. There was a lot of beaming when I picked up my (pre-ordered, no less) copy of La Belle Sauvage, and I was so bloody excited to get started. The themes debated in the Northern Lights trilogy (and especially in The Amber Spyglass) were right up my alley – life and death and organised religion are just what I enjoy chatting about on a Saturday night – but I wasn’t sure if I was expecting them in this book. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting at all – I didn’t bother trying to read into the cover, or the name, or anything at all. I wanted to drift along the beautifully flowing river (*snorts*) of words that Pullman has constructed, and I did.

I’m not too sure how much I want to say about the plot. It’s exciting and wonderful, focusing on Lyra’s babyhood, a boy called Malcolm Polstead, and a boat called La Belle Sauvage. There’s a flood – this isn’t a spoiler, because it’s rather explicitly on the cover – and I will say nothing more, apart from the fact that it builds on certain groups (and individuals) as mentioned in the original trilogy. I don’t want to say any more!

This was like a flashback to the first time I read Northern Lights. Each character I recognised – Lyra! Lord Asriel! Farder Coram! The Master of Jordan College! – was accompanied with a rush of excitement, like finally seeing an old friend. Hell, I even got excited by the first mention of the alethiometer. AlethiometerS.

It was this recognition that I loved the most, aside from Pullman’s brilliant building of Lyra’s Oxford. In my opinion, the story was not as mind-blowing as the others in the original trilogy – although who knows what could happen in the next book – but it was a rollicking read. I’m still fangirling, because La Belle Sauvage is exciting and engaging and makes me want to relive the Northern Lights joy all over again.

I can’t really say if La Belle Sauvage is what I was expecting, because I didn’t have any set expectations. I already knew that I adored Pullman’s writing and his creation of worlds and characters. I knew that I wanted to read this as a form of escapism, as a throwback to my first reading of Northern Lights, when I was blissfully ignorant of what A-Levels actually entailed.

All I can say is that I would, with all my tiny, cremated heart, recommend this book. Read the original trilogy first (and maybe Lyra’s Oxford if you’re feeling really committed), and then delve into La Belle Sauvage with joy.

also if anyone at all has any comments on this book, or His Dark Materials in general, or Philip Pullman, then please comment because I desperately would like someone to fangirl with!

I’ve been dipping in and out of volumes of poetry recently. There are certain people, certain events – clichés of course, things like sunsets and wispy morning mists and dew-heavy flowers – that make me think ‘yes! I want to write poetry about you!’ But right now, sadly I’ve got all the poetic talent of a cat with a feather quill. And cats don’t even have opposable thumbs.

Luckily, I’ve still got eyes, so at least I can read it, if not write. My tastes in poetry are wide-ranging, to say the least. Part of the reason why I’ve never given a volume of poetry as a present – despite dishing novels out left, right, and centre – is because I’m never quite sure if my tastes will be appropriate. William Blake’s a safe call, as is (in my opinion) Walt Whitman and Carol Anne Duffy. But my other great love – the metaphysical poets – may not be so appropriate.

Although the term ‘metaphysical poet’ is broad-reaching and there’s nothing concrete to define precisely what makes a metaphysical poet, well, metaphysical. But here’s the link to an enlightening essay by T S Eliot, if you’re as interested (read: nerdy) as me.

Giving someone a copy of To His Coy Mistress could be amusing. The phrase ‘my growing vegetable love’ never fails to raise a smile. Unless in the middle of an English lesson, when the best one can do is grimace and wish you were anywhere else.

But that’s what I love about the metaphysical poets. They’re explicit and entertaining and although the language isn’t necessarily the most straightforward, every poem is a blast. They’re contemplative and interesting and sometimes like the 17th century version of sliding into someone’s DMs. Alas, I can’t imagine being wooed into bed by poorly hidden euphemisms and verse. I can’t imagine being wooed into bed full stop, unless the lure is twelve hours of uninterrupted sleep and breakfast in bed in the morning.

Dipping in and out of lots of different poetry volumes means that I’ve found many new favourites. Read Marvell’s Definition of Love, Eliot’s The Lovesong of Alfred J Prufrock, and above all, Larkin’s Aubade. A lingering poem, and if it makes you cry, don’t blame me.

This book – and the Everyday Sexism project – is so, so important. It’s startlingly relevant today, right now, concerning the Weinstein allegations and that whole culture in Hollywood, and the dirt that’s starting to emerge from the political sphere. As part of an awakening, of alerting wider society to the dangers of sexism and stereotyping, this book is very important indeed.

Reading about the influence of body image on young girls reminded me instantly of a similar incident way back in primary school, when I looked like a bamboo pole with glasses and horrific hair. Getting changed for PE, I was singled me out, being asked questions about my rapidly advancing leg hair. Quite frankly, I felt like a gorilla. I was the only one with my kind of complexion – I’m half Thai – and I hated it. This sounds awfully pathetic now, but I remember going home to my dad and bawling my short-sighted little eyes out. I hated the way I looked, felt, was singled out as other. After at first attempting to persuade me that no-one gives a shit, and if they do, they’re awful people anyway, he then phoned the local beauty salon. They then proceeded to tell me exactly the same thing, but if I was really worried, I could wait until eighteen and get laser hair removal.

Years later, at seventeen, I’ve not de-fuzzed down there for over a year and am embracing the ‘hairy cushion’ aesthetic. I don’t care. Anyone who might see my pins – and now that it’s practically winter, that’s all of one person – doesn’t care. But it’s awful to think that a few bitchy remarks about my furry legs can damage a little girl’s self-esteem to such an extent. I loathed the way I looked for a painfully long while. I’ve realised that it’s impossible – and expensive – to polish a turd, so this particular turd prefers to loaf about in whatever’s clean. I’ve surrounded myself with people who couldn’t care less. But although this period of slovenly bliss has come, it’s a little late – but better late than never.

This is where Everyday Sexism comes in. Because sexism isn’t just mansplaining or a partner telling you that you need to whip the wax out because gurl, you look like a carpet with legs. Honestly, if my boyfriend tried to do that, I’d see how he’d like having the hair on his thighs and god-knows-where-else ripped out. Sexism is rooted in the toys we play with as children, the role models that are enforced, in our education system, in employment, every-bloody-where. And this book really hammers this home.

It’s strange, because I keep on relating incidents and sections in Everyday Sexism back to my own life. On one hand, I was a proper princess, but on the other, my dad encouraged me to play with cars and soil and build stuff. There is a particularly interesting chapter on politics, which reminded me of my ambition – aged nine, no less – to become a politician, and maybe Prime Minister. That’s right, yours truly has been an angry political commentator for many a year. I’ll always remember that the girl sat near me wanted to be a princess with a prince and a nice dress. I, meanwhile, was rabbiting on about saving the world, because even to my tender, nine-year old eyes, everything seemed like a bit of a cock-up.

Nothing much has changed there, has it?

It’s not denouncing the dreams of those who want to be princesses. It’s alerting little girls that they can be whatever the hell they want – author, doctor, astronaut, designer – and whoever the hell they want. It’s about telling boys that it’s okay to cry, that this attitude of toxic masculinity is wrong, that emotions are not to be suppressed. It’s saying that sexual harrassment and abuse is wrong, that ‘a bit of fun’ for one party is not ‘a bit of fun’ for the other.

Everyday Sexism (the book) has stats and first-hand accounts and I applaud the bravery of those who have stood up and contributed. I don’t care if this isn’t the most illuminating or interesting description, because the content will ring true and resonate.

Read the damn book!

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/02/everyday-sexism-by-laura-bates/feed/220171102_170237[1]izzycdSilencing the Mockingbird?https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/29/silencing-the-mockingbird/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/29/silencing-the-mockingbird/#commentsSun, 29 Oct 2017 09:31:52 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5201Read More Silencing the Mockingbird?]]>The literary world has been in uproar – at least, the little corner of it that I monitor – concerning the controversial decision to at first remove, and then only allow reading with parental permission, To Kill a Mockingbird from a Mississippi school curriculum. Nice one, America! Great choices being made this year!

I’m a lover of To Kill a Mockingbird, although I’ve not read it for at least a year. Go Set a Watchman was the first book that I ever pre-ordered, jiggling about with excitement for publication day. I cried when Harper Lee died. I am also a firm believer that literature, whilst also being beautiful and pleasurable and a grand form of escapism etc. etc., should also sometimes have the responsibility to educate people. And, in my opinion, that is precisely what To Kill a Mockingbird does.

It tells the horrors of discrimination, and the necessity of a real-life Atticus Finch (who is incidentally one of the fictional characters I’d most like to marry). Yes, Lee uses the n-word, but children cannot be insulated from reality for ever. That word is still being used today, and yes, it can be stomach crawling and awkward because it reminds us of the mistakes of our ancestors and the ridiculousness of white supremacy. It is not until we learn from the (many) mistakes of our ancestors that discrimination and hatred and all the nasty stuff will cease. And educating these young people – the future – is the first step in a long road to an equal society.

Not enough young people read for pleasure anyway. Even in my A-Level English Lit class – idealistically made up of people like myself, who arrive at social gatherings prepared with one book, plus an emergency volume of poetry – there are people who confess to not having read a single book beyond the syllabus. They claim to ‘not have the time’, that they’re too busy picking their noses in front of Stranger Things or RuPaul’s Drag Race to bother reading. Bull! Shit! This is the reason why controversial, eye-opening books are positively needed on a curriculum. It’s all well and good arguing that diversity and discrimination can be tackled on TV (although more Asian ethnic minorities, please!), but this is a fight that needs to be fought on all platforms. Education – both formal and informal – is necessary for making the world a better place, for making humans better people. And reading books is one way to start this.

I also think that this controversy will attract kids to this book. I’m always interested in a scandal, and a literary one is even better. I know that if I was a Mississippi school kid, I would be eager to learn what the hell all this fuss was about. Then again, I was also the kid who loved Macbeth and Titus Andronicus because that’s where all the creepiest and bloodiest deaths were. But hey, if it gets one more kid into reading, that’s no bad thing.

Here’s the Guardian article, if you want a point of view that’s more coherent and less sweary than mine. I’d recommend a browse through the rest of the website too. Go educate yourself in regards to liberal media, and then quickly browse Mail Online to get some perspective. I’d recommend having clean water on-hand to rinse your eyes out afterwards, because that stuff is vile.

Have you heard of this story? Any thoughts? Do you too want to moan about the D*ily M*il? Drop me a line!

Walking past a charity bookshop without buying anything is not one of my skills. I have no self-restraint, and will probably regret spending so much money on books once I’m living away from home as a penniless student, eating cereal for every meal and without the money to turn the heating on.

The Eye in the Door by Pat Barker
I’m currently reading Regeneration, a year after I first bought it, and hadn’t realised that it was a trilogy until I finally read the blurb. Last night. 150 pages in. So much for knowing what you’re in for. The Eye in the Door is the second book in trilogy, and as I’m enjoying Regeneration so much, I thought ‘why the hell not?’.

I mean, there are many reasons why not – like the astronomical price of train tickets, my rapidly decreasing funds, and my rapidly increasing TBR pile – but intellectual pursuits will always reign supreme, right?

Regeneration is a very good book, by the way. Wilfred Owen! Siegfried Sassoon! (who I once named one of my fish after). Depicts a perspective of World War One which I’d barely considered before – the mental institutions. Would highly recommend.

LA BELLE SAUVAGE (The Book of Dust, Volume One) by Philip Pullman
Do I even need to explain why I bought this? I’ve been waiting for The Book of Dust ever since I read His Dark Materials, and bloody hell !! I can barely contain my excitement. I positively beamed at the guy in Waterstones when he handed the package over. I’d had it pre-ordered for months. I’m so, so ready to get started on this. Regret not having a celebratory read-through of His Dark Materials beforehand, however.

Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves
I remembered Graves being mentioned in Regeneration, and having more money than sense – plus a penchant for artistically greyscale book covers – meant that at under two quid, this was irresistible. I’ve read some of Graves’s poetry previously, and Regeneration has sparked a new-found interest in WW1. Appropriate reading for this time of year, being so close to Rememberance Sunday.

Shakespearean Tragedy by A C Bradley
I can’t get within six feet of the York Notes Othello guide – or an English teacher – without having Bradley quotes fired at me. So why not get it straight from the horse’s mouth?
Not likening a world-renowned, highly intelligent academic to a horse, obviously.
These lectures cover Shakespeare’s ‘great’ tragedies – Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear, and Othello. Although the only one I’m studying for school is Othello, I’ve seen all of these plays produced (Rupert Goold’s Soviet-esque Macbeth CHANGED ME), and am looking forward to having my mind blown once again. Hopefully.

The Faber Book of Modern Verse
Looking back, I’m not entirely sure if I needed this. (I don’t really need to buy any of my books, but that’s beside the point!) Having done quite a lot of work last term on modernism (epistemological anxiety, anyone?), I’m pleased that I’ve maintained my sanity and love of modernist poetry. That’s what I’ve assumed is in this volume, anyway. This was very much an impulse buy, but oh well. Two quid for a collection of poetry almost as thick as my forearm – what’s not to love?

If you’ve read any of these books, feel free to give me a shout. Apart from La Belle Sauvage – if you’ve read that already, please shut your trap because I DO NOT WANT TO KNOW.

]]>https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/28/book-haul/feed/220171027_164329[1]izzycdI Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayeshttps://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/23/i-am-pilgrim-by-terry-hayes/
https://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/23/i-am-pilgrim-by-terry-hayes/#commentsMon, 23 Oct 2017 13:10:44 +0000http://thinkingandinkingblog.wordpress.com/?p=5117Read More I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes]]>Having read American Pyscho, I thought that I’d be able to handle blood and gore and dismembered prostitutes. Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!

I wouldn’t advise you to read this one if you’ve got a weak stomach. I can barely watch the gory bits of Doc Martin, so reading about how someone’s eyes get gouged out of their living body wasn’t quite my cup of tea.

Mind you, I should have seen what was coming. There’s a brief description of each gruesome act – and there’s not just the eye-gouging – on the blurb, for crying out loud.

This is a fast-paced thriller by all accounts. Having not had much experience with this particular genre – despite my dad’s undying love for Lee Child, John Grisham and Gerald Seymour – I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I guessed that there would be some murders and some hostages and a top secret mission and probably a car chase. But I most certainly didn’t expect myself to be so engrossed in the story.

I finished this in 3 days! An 800+ page novel in 72 hours, whilst simultaneously juggling a cold and a concerning amount of English coursework. Impressive, no? I fell hook, line and sinker for this novel’s plot and pace – it was escapism to the extreme.

Trust me, my life is nothing like that of Pilgrim, the super-secret secret agent flying across the globe in search of Saracen, a dangerous man with no traces.

I don’t want to explain anything else about the plot. Everything took me by surprise; Hayes rapidly guides you from America to Turkey to the Hindu Kush, twisting and turning and it’s impossible to get off this roller-coaster ride. There are murders that may – or may not- be linked, a plot to destroy America, and this can only be solved by one man – Pilgrim.

It’s brilliant. Again, I don’t want to say anything about Hayes’s writing style, because to be quite honest, I did not care. Nothing stood out to me as being particularly eloquent; I didn’t need to take a step a back and cry or anything. I was so caught up in the action, that he could have confused ‘your’ and ‘you’re’ and I wouldn’t have given a rat’s backside. This is an exciting novel. There’s no time to fuss about semi-colons out in the field, faced by a group of large, angry Greeks armed with even larger guns.

I would most certainly recommend I Am Pilgrim. Despite the gore – which you can easily skim read over – it’s an engrossing, interesting thriller. You’re not given the complete picture until the very end, and it’s the momentum of mystery that keeps this novel speeding along.

Damn, this was a good read. Don’t be put off by its size – the ride’s worth it.